H.E.R.’s Success Is a Testament to the Spectacle of Mystery

The 21-year-old R&B phenom is a world-class singer, nominated for five Grammy Awards this year. But the true power of her art resides in the mystique she’s constructed through concealment.

It’s tough to get away with rocking sunglasses indoors unless you’re blind, a world-class poker player, or Anna Wintour. It’s a rock star affectation that, as a BBC article once put it, is a sure way to make “people in a room instantly… judge you a colossal, thundering ninny.”

There’s one other exception, though, and that is H.E.R. For the virtuoso 21-year-old singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist, wearing sunglasses indoors looks remarkably natural. Maybe that’s because she’s never publicly been without her shades. Or maybe it’s because H.E.R.’s sunglasses are meant to be a sort of anti-affectation, the last remnant of her prior invisibility. When H.E.R debuted at 19, she presented herself anonymously—there were songs, a silhouette, an acronym (H.E.R. stands for “Having Everything Revealed”), and a cryptic message from her label’s publicists. The secrecy was intended to be in service of the music. She wanted her songs to be relatable to everyone, no matter their age, gender, or ethnicity. And, more importantly, she wanted the music to stand on its own, to not be clouded by her appearance or personality.

The approach worked and, also, it didn’t. Just ten days after being posted to SoundCloud, H.E.R. songs racked up nearly 80,000 plays. She quickly made vocal fans of superstars like Alicia Keys, Wyclef Jean, Janet Jackson, Rihanna, and Bryson Tiller—the latter of whom she would eventually tour alongside. And, of course, there are this year’s Grammy nominations. H.E.R. is nominated for five awards, including Best New Artist, Best R&B Album, and Album of the Year. The enormity of H.E.R.’s success has been undeniable, and it’s come without scandal, sexualization, or an outsized social media presence. “I think I did exactly what I wanted to do, considering the five Grammy nominations,” she told the New York Times in December. “People are focused on the music and that was what was most important to me—people appreciating my art above all things.”

But it would be a stretch to suggest H.E.R.’s art has existed in a vacuum. To the contrary: the byproduct of H.E.R.’s secrecy is that it’s become as central to her identity as her stout voice and lovelorn lyrics. It’s made fans ravenous for information—quickly uncovering that H.E.R. is Gabriella Wilson, a child prodigy who appeared on the Today Show at 10 years-old to belt out a brilliant Alicia Keys cover, and who was signed to RCA by 14. And the media, likewise, has been taken by the mystery. In every interview H.E.R. gives, there’s a line of questioning about her anonymity. When she was a guest on Angie Martinez’s radio show, the station even dimmed the lights—not so much to conceal H.E.R. for the video broadcast as to play into H.E.R.’s furtive aura. Rather than obscuring her identity, as intended, H.E.R.’s sunglasses have become a symbol of it: She is an everywoman who also maintains the cool distance of an overburdened celebrity.

Paradoxically, reticence to divulge information has been a tack well-suited to this Instagram story-heavy, share-happy moment. As social media has allowed virtually everyone to be virtually everywhere, withholding has gained a profound power. Fatimah Warner has used the stage name Noname to elude classification. And before H.E.R., The Weeknd built a mystique as a cipher who lurked in the shadows, concealing his face in photos, and his given name in the press. “We live in an era when everything is so excessive, I think it’s refreshing for everybody to be like, ‘Who the fuck is this guy?'” The Weeknd told Rolling Stone in 2015, as his star was rising. “I think that’s why my career is going to be so long: Because I haven’t given people everything.”

Likewise, the brilliant insight of Fox’s new psychedelic reality show The Masked Singer is that viewers don’t watch singing competitions like American Idol and The Voice for the songs, or even for the bombs; they watch them for the sport. The show disguises its celebrity contestants in flamboyant-dystopian costumes—Tommy Chong as The Pineapple, and Margaret Cho as The Poodle—and asks them to perform gaudy karaoke. The principal tension is not “Who sings the best?”; it’s “Who is the goddamn Raven?” Viewers participate by tweeting their guesses as to who might be behind each mask. And blog postsarewritten every week speculating on who each singer might be. The show’s tagline is, “It’s not a ‘whodunit,’ it’s a ‘whosungit!’”

Being a fan of H.E.R. can feel like its own kind of whosungit. Her lush range is distinct, her smooth-yet-vulnerable R&B stylings consistent, but for those invested in the singer, each song plays out like a clue. H.E.R., the compilation nominated for Album of the Year, meanders through unrequited love and deep passion, giving the listener a glimpse of her feelings and experiences. Yet, the details in her songs—the places, the people, the seasons—are rarely specific, which allows listeners to place themselves inside her narratives. But they’re also, wisely, a means of leaving more of herself to be revealed.

H.E.R. probably doesn’t think about what she’s doing this way. She talks about her anonymity in pure terms. “For a while, we’ve kind of lost the focus on what’s important, and that’s the music,” H.E.R. told Angie Martinez, when asked about her surreptitiousness. “It shouldn’t be about the faces and association and who has the most followers. It’s not a popularity contest to me. It should always be about the music. And I think that’s why real R&B is coming back, because artists are showing more of the authenticity, and we’re focused on the music and not anything else.”

It’s true that H.E.R. is part of a resurgence of traditional—though not necessarily “real”—R&B that isn’t inflected by hip-hop in the way of most post-Drake R&B. But within that movement, H.E.R. has stood out, receiving the most media attention and accolades. Is that because her voice is so far superior to her peers’? Her songwriting so much more resonant? Or is it because her story is the most compelling?

Thus far in her young career, H.E.R.’s greatest—and maybe only—innovation has been her secretive persona. Her music, though well crafted, bears the weight of her influences. She’s filtering smooth, Quiet Storm-style R&B into the present, with modern production (airy, clean soundscapes fueled by slow 808 beats) and motifs (on “Focus,” she wishes a lover would look up from his phone and pay her attention). But art is never just about the art, and building a fascinating mythos is no small feat. H.E.R.’s sunglasses don’t shield her art, but they do elevate it. And hell, it really is a big deal that she can rock them indoors without coming off as a colossal, thundering ninny—or, for that matter, a poser.